Spoken Language
Nearly all Balinese speak the national language of Indonesia, Bahasa Indonesia, a language Indonesian nationalists developed from the Malay language. The Balinese language is a completely different language from Bahasa Indonesia,
The Balinese language has many levels but each of the level uses the same basic linguistic structure and many common nouns, you can find so many vocabulary for each level varies. This is particularly true of verbs connected with human activities and body parts.
When referring to eating, for example, one would ask “Have you eaten?” by saying to a member of the higher castes “Ratu sampun marayunan,” but to a person of low status, the same question is “cai subs madaar”.
The Balinese caste system requires that different vocabularies be used according to differences in rank. This means that a low caste person uses the formal high Balinese words in speaking to a person of a higher caste, while the latter will answer using the low vocabulary; you speak “up” to a person of higher status, who speaks “down” to you. As caste distinctions loosen, people prefer to use a respectful version of high Balinese among people they do not know or in formal situations, while still speaking low or common Balinese among family and friends.
Since Bahasa Indonesia is taught in schools and used as the lingua franca of commerce and government, its use has had a democratizing effect, unifying the scattered islands of the country and blurring the once distinct levels of Balinese speech.
Visit Bali
Leave your response!
You must be logged in to post a comment.